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A THANKSGIVING SERMON, 



PREACHED IN EMMANUEL CHURCH, BALTIMORE, NOV. 24, 1864, 



BY 

NOAH HUNT SCHENCK, 



RECTOR. 



PUBLISHED BY REQUEST. 



/ 

BALTIMORE : 
ENTZ & BASH 

1864. 



SERMON 



Ps. iv. 5, 6 — "Offer the Sacrifices of Righteousness, and put your trust 
in the Lord. There be many that say, Who will shew us any good? 
Lord, lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us." 



Jesus upon Olivet gave us a law which bears importantly upon 
the text and the times. To give love for love and blessing for 
blessing is so manifestly a profitable exchange for man, that it 
entitles him to neither commendation nor reward. But the 
return of good for bad to our brother, this is the temper of soul 
which shall make us "the children of the Highest." By a parity 
of reasoning, the giving of gratitude to God for prosperity is but 
signing a receipt for the delivery of valuables ; an act of justice 
not of merit. The rendering back however of thanksgiving for 
chastening, the lifting up of praise from a heart that is charged 
with sorrow, the kissing the hand that smites, the recognition of 
a beneficent Providence in the hour of sternest discipline, this it 
is which is gilded with the golden light of God's favor, — for it is 
an exercise of that faith which works by love and is proved by 
tribulation. 

On this day, the appointed season of national thanksgiving, we 
are once more gathered in our houses of prayer to offer the "sacri- 
fices of righteousness" beneath dark and frowning skies. We are 
invoked to give thanks to God even while our back is bowed and 
smarting; under the rod of correction. It is a sublime exercise of 
faith. Not but what there is still enjoyed by us a rich remnant of 
blessing, but so prone are we to exact the full measure of pros- 
perity, that we sit down in discontent when the cup is diminished 
or temporarily withheld. Thus constituted, if faith assumes office 
in our time of trial, we are lifted by it into upper levels and a 
clearer light. Therefore the "sacrifices of righteousness" which 
we offer to-day, is but the " putting our trust in the Lord." The 
voices of untrustful repining which rise from our hearts demanding 
" who will shew us any good," are answered by the prayers now 



4 

going up from a thousand altars, "Lord, lift thou up the light 
of thy countenance upon us." 

The life of a nation like the life of a man, is subject to a mixed 
dispensation of good and ill. The moral economy of our world is 
everywhere characterized by the alternation or intermingling of 
the conflicting elements of blessing and cursing. Though God 
deals with nations by a different law from that with which he 
deals with man, yet have they the same chequered record of pros- 
perity and adversity. The former find however their compensa- 
tions in the judgments of earth ; the latter in the published 
decrees of the final day of account. Our nation is having the 
same experience as others. Still history does not repeat itself. 
New developments and new combinations are always making new 
history. But God's method of reward and punishment is always 
the same, and in this all nations have common experience. The 
people of this American land have lived under the sunshine and 
blue from the beginning until now. Prosperity, progress and 
success have become such familiar ideas that we have vaunted 
ourselves into a pride of power and position more offensive to 
Heaven, than, if it were possible, to some of our trans-atlantic 
rivals in trade and art. The popular lexicon has long ago ceased 
to contain " impossible;" and I almost fear the popular heart 
has eliminated from the equation of national life, the Providential 
element, except so far as it may be necessary to the success of 
what lias already been definitely and determinedly and finally 
resolved. Now-a-days the statesman, the moralist, and the 
preacher, tell us what must happen, and then assure us that 
Providence will unquestionably bring it to pass. To this we 
have come through a career of unexampled prosperity. Not a 
century yet since this nation had its birth, and it stands before 
the world a Colossus of power. To-day it is putting forth arms 
of strength more muscular and massive than have ever been 
bared before the world by any state. What a hot-bed growth of 
all economical interests has been ours. Never has a nation been 
so tried by prosperity as ours. We have achieved in a century 
wliat England has slowly reached in a decade of centuries. But 
on the maxim ''the greater the interest the more insecure the 
investment," we have come to learn that rapid accumulation, in 
national as in individual lite, is fraught with many dangers. A 
quick depletion is but too often the consequence of such rapid 
accretion, to say nothing of the humiliation and bitterness and 
calamity which follow in the train oi the former. Up to the 



present epoch the life of this nation has been one of apparent 
health, its history one of unexampled successes, its dispensation 
one of continuous blessing. Let us not be so blinded by the 
red glare of present disaster as to forget these mercies of the past. 
Let us never forget the grateful irrigation of this broad continent 
by the sparkling streams which have steadily flowed from the 
springs of civil and religious liberty, opened to us in that great 
convulsion which gave birth to our nation. Let us never forget 
this short but sublime career in which there has been an unprece- 
dented vitality infused, and an unexampled development afforded 
to invention and commerce, to agriculture and trade, to manufac- 
tures, and to art, to science and polite learning, to all the educa- 
tional and industrial interests of the state. What a peopling of 
vast territories ! What a diffusing of information ! What an 
extending of the Church ! What contributing to the domestic 
comfort and moral dignity of man ! What an expanding of spir- 
itual privilege ! What an augmenting of national strength ! 
What a putting forth of all the functions of a lusty life and its 
enlarging energies, have we already recorded in the first volume 
of our country's history. God forgive us that we have not the 
record of a proportionably enlarged fidelity to Him, and an 
equally rapid growth and expansion of the principles of "true and 
undeflled religion." But now in this sudden check and solemn 
pause of prosperity, we may readily see that the composition of both 
our civil and religious liberty has been defective. Both have 
needed the blood of Martyrs. 

The American people have always regarded themselves legiti- 
mate heirs to all the blessings ; by reason of the very skies above 
them and the very soil beneath them, born heir to the citizens' 
summum bonum. Our ancestors came here either in the possession 
of religious liberty or to receive it. They came in the possession 
of civil liberty, or to receive it; and when as just previous to the 
Revolution it was threatened for the moment, they struck for 
independence, not liberty, — for that they had before. What we 
have not earned we do not adequately value. America inherited 
liberty, not earned it; and therefore it has never had a just appre- 
ciation among the people. That which is the seed of the Church 
is the vital principle of the state, — is, under God, the agency for 
acquiring and perpetuating the true spirit of liberty. It may 
be that this generation shall not pass away, before — it may be 
that this generation is already beholding the incorporation of 
this precious element. When we have the experience of martyr- 



dom, we shall have the priceless martyr heritage for the nation's 
great future. If we are now hinging upon this epoch, "let all 
the people praise Thee God, yea let all the people praise Thee." 
Still it is to be through the fires. Doubtless they are kindled. 
For what intent the All-wise only knoweth. The lessons of his- 
tory, sacred and profane, are however distinct in their teaching 
to the present crisis, that we are passing under a different dispen- 
sation, however short or long, in compensating contrast to our 
earlier generations of unbroken blessing. 

We are now learning in sorrow the lessons so poorly studied in 
our joy. By weal or by woe they must be studied and must be 
learned. And herein, moreover, is the balance of justice to the 
aggregate sin of the race; the temporal judgments decreed and 
visited upon the nations, foreshadowing faintly but fairly the eternal 
judgment upon those human units of which the nations are made 
up. To the spectator, whether Patriot or Christian, gazing upon 
the enacted drama of our national life, the scene has shifted. 
The jocund landscape and the sweet-piped roundelay, the freighted 
argosies and harvest-laden wains, give place to "the sulphurous 
canopy" and the steed-trampled plain, long lines of embattled 
men and the frowning front of bristling bastions. Peace and 
thrift make way for war and prodigality. Yes, the scene is 
changed. The regime is changed. The men have changed. 
The ideas have changed. The temper of the nation is changed. 
All is changed save the superintending Providence of the un- 
changing Ruler and Director of all. The pulse of the people beats 
quicker. The common breast is heaving high with novel emo- 
tions. The common brain is busied with daring speculation, and 
braced with a Crusader-like determination. Now, that such 
potent ingredients are thrown into the caldron of popular im- 
pulse and action, — now, that the leash is loosed from the dogs of 
war, and no longer held in hand, — now, that we are whirling 
onward in such a swollen and angry tide, — now, that we are 
involved in events as morally important as they are politically 
grand and significant, what is left us but to lift up our feeble 
hands, our hopeful hearts, and appeal to God with the cry of 
Paul, "Who is sufficient for these things?" What is left us but 
to "offer the sacrifices of righteousness and put our trust in the 
Lord'^" 

And can we, as on this day invited, offer these sacrifices 
and repose this trust? Should the Son of man now coming, 
find this faith in our Limited lot of earth? There is a theology 



which teaches the test of a true faith to be the willingness to 
praise God for the vindication of His justice and truth, though 
this vindication, of necessity, involves the individual in the woes 
of damnation. However we may admire the eminence of that 
faith, perched so high above the common experience, it behooves 
us, we think, even more than we admire, to emulate it; not as in 
this extreme and even impossible expression, but in its unques- 
tioning and adoring spirit of resignation to Him "who doeth all 
things well." The religion which rejoices only in the sunshine 
is but a poor panoply for the soul that is hastening to the " dark 
valley and shadow." That man has no honest belief in God's 
existence or wisdom or superintendency, who cannot see Him just 
as clearly in the dark as in the light ; nay, more, see His good- 
ness and mercy and truth in the thickest gloom of disaster and 
the starless midnight of despair. True faith makes its choicest 
offerings of righteousness while standing far removed from the 
light, far back in deepest shadow. It lays them on the raven 
wing of night and flutters the pinions of darkness till the gifts go 
up to God. Let us prove our faith to-day by a true sacrifice of 
righteousness. "Out of the deep" do we call unto the Lord, but 
let the cry go gladly upward, as the voice of those who "know in 
whom they have believed." 

But what are the sacrifices which we place upon the altar 
and to which we invoke the attention of Jehovah. Grate- 
ful hearts are there, our vows of service are there, our alms 
are there, and the record of our labor in the Lord. But these 
are the sacrifices of allegiance, not of righteousness. Trust, 
blind and implicit, absorbing and unwavering, unquestioning 
and unrepining trust in the Lord, — this is the chiefest of the 
sacrifices of righteousness. Never in history was a Christ- 
illumined laud so invoked to make this offering, never was there 
greater need, never was there a sublimer occasion. that a live 
coal would drop from the golden and glowing altar which flames 
forever with the light of perfect sacrifice before the Father's 
throne, and falling upon the nation's lips, and striking its heat 
into the nation's heart, would kindle the one to lofty devotion and 
warm the other to perfect trust. To-day the nation assumes an 
attitude of formal faith. Will not the blessed God, to whom we 
make thanksgiving and before whom we offer sacrifice, to whom 
we look for help and favor and from whom we expect all our sup- 
plies, will He not, by His transforming touch change our for- 
mality to fervency; and so enable this nation to-day, as the act of 



8 

one man, to "offer the sacrifices of righteousness" by putting "its 
trust in the Lord?" But as in strongest contrast to our vaunted 
self-dependency, this people is peculiarly called at this juncture to 
put its trust in the Lord, as the sacrifice of righteousness specially 
demanded, — so moreover, in violent contrast to the bitterness 
which war has distilled into the common heart, is the nation 
recalled to the duties of our human fraternity and specially 
invoked to make offerings of reconciliation. 

Next in importance to Trust, is Love as a sacrifice of righteous- 
ness. "If we love one another God dwelleth in us." According 
to the analogy of our soul-life, by faith the nation is to lay hold 
upon God and by love secure his presence as a Dweller in 
its midst. Before then we approach the altar with our thank- 
offering to-day, let us order our hearts in peace to our brother. 
that this hell-hound of hate might be hunted from our hearts 
and homes, from the length and breadth of our land. Shout 
it forth to the nation gathered before God to-day in prayer 
and thanksgiving, — "If we love one another God dwelleth 
in us." Declare it from the housetops and let it ring through 
the churches, — "If we love one another God dwelleth in us." 
This is the Gospel of the Grace of God to the nation, as it 
is to the soul. This is the method by which the people are to 
secure the presence and cooperation of God in their civil sanctifi- 
cation. There is no pledge of the Divine indwelling except upon 
this condition. If the state must array itself in the red robe of 
war and stand before the world in garments soiled with the dust 
of conflict and reeking with the gore of battle, let it be in sor- 
row not in anger, — let it be under the influence of hallowed con- 
viction, and not the domination of anger and pride. Am I not 
right, fellow Christians and fellow patriots, in urging upon you 
to offer unto God this day for your sacrifices of righteousness, 
before you approach liim with the voice of thanksgiving, the 
tribute of a rekindled faith in God and a reanimated love for man. 
Lay these twin-gifts upon the altar. Deck them with the grace- 
ful garlanding of Christian Hope. Breathe over them the pious 
petition of the royal worshipper, "Lord lift thou up the light of 
thy countenance upon us." Stand near the place of sacrifice, as 
stood Elijah in the shadow of Carmel, waiting with heart and 
hands reached out, with eyes and voice upraised to God, until the 
fire fall IVoi 1 1 Heaven and embrace the accepted offering. Stand 
near, niv Brothers, as stood the trusting Prophet and "(Jed even 
our own God will give us his blessing." 



9 

But let us well remember that whatever gift we bring to God 
this day, whatever our sacrifices, they are all in one sense a 
thank-offering. And if so be, we come before the Lord in right- 
eousness, we shall have the richer occasion, the stronger impulse 
to pour out our souls before Him in a gushing libation of praise 
and thanksgiving. Thus reasoned David with himself standing 
by his altar of faith and prayer, and as he thought of the un- 
grateful people who murmured because of the paucity of their 
blessings or the multitude of their miseries saying, "who will 
shew us any good," he raised his voice in an argument of prayer, 
setting forth the fact that the light of the Lord's countenance 
lifted up upon the people was ample compensation for all their 
ills, that the revealing of His face was like unto the glad bright- 
ness of the morning and the assurance of His presence a token of 
"the fullness of joy." 

Let it be my grateful office on this appointed day of gratitude 
to make response to those who murmur in heart and vainly 
inquire in these times of discipline "who will shew us any good." 
Or rather let me summon to this audience chamber of God such 
living witnesses as will give them the testimony they need. 

Will the Husbandman shew us any good? See him as he comes 
rejoicing with his sheaves. Behold the cheek tanned by the har- 
vest sun. Kegard the barns filled with plenty to which he points 
you. Listen to the voice with which he blesses God for the 
increase of field and fold. Accept the proof he presents of the 
unchanging goodness of that Providence who droppeth so evenly 
from Heaven the balmy sunshine and the fruitful showers — who 
redeemeth with each returning "seed time and harvest" the 
pledges of a bountiful supply to this thronged and needy earth. 
True, there are fields that are only ploughed by the wheels of 
war, districts desolated by the ravage of armies, waste places which 
know more of the baptism of blood and tears than the germi- 
nating rain and dew. Valleys that laughed and hills that skipped 
for joy are now silent and barren, robbed of their riches, spoiled 
of their beauty and hushed of their grateful mirth. Still the 
broader fields of plenty send greeting to these desolate places, 
and of their fullness make supply. The broad bosom of our rich 
domain has yielded abundantly for the wants of all, and thus far 
famine has not followed the footsteps of war. The blight and 
mildew have been graciously withheld, and the granaries of the 
land are teeming with the garnered treasures of the Husband- 
man. God be praised for the grain and the fruits! God be 



10 

praised for the barns "filled with plenty," and the presses that 
"burst out with new wine!" 

From the tiller of the soil we turn to the tiller of the soul. Will 
he "shew us any good?" Standing in his lot, he looks out upon 
a scene of moral conflict and civil confusion. He is a spectator 
to the clash of arms, to the more deadly clash of principle and 
feeling. A herald of the Prince of Peace, he comes with his cre- 
dentials and his message to men whose minds are largely pre- 
occupied with war. He points his appeals to hearts so swayed at 
times with wild emotions as to escape his gospel shafts. Obsta- 
cles incident to a condition of war, but heretofore unknown among 
this people, rise up before him in frowning array. New forms 
of vice make head or common vices are multiplied and magnified. 
His feeble voice is drowned in the roar of the people. His moral 
strength avails but little against the dash of the tide. But woe 
to him if his lips be closed to the utterance of the Truth, woe to 
him if he yield to the current, when it sets not strongly in the 
channel of the Eight. But with his report neglected or unbe- 
lieved, does he come into the witness stand to-day with no testi- 
mony of the manifested goodness of the covenant-keeping God ? 
Nay, he tells us of more than even open Bibles and a free gospel. 
He gives glad witness to the deepening spirit of sacrifice and con- 
secration among those who are deeply concerned for the honor of 
God and the rescue of souls. He tells of the sublime philanthropy, 
the immense organizations of society for the relief of human suffer-- 
in<»-. He recounts the self-devotion of those who are alleviating 
the consequences of "man's inhumanity to man." He exhibits 
the lavish liberality which is ministering to the wants and woes 
of the wasted and wounded. This is not religion, but it is her 
handmaiden and valuable coadjutor. It is a discipline and de- 
velopment which tells indirectly but importantly upon the great 
interests of the Redeemer's kingdom. This is not a catholic but 
an eclectic spirit, still it opens fountains which are rarely or never 
closed, and whose waters are wont to grow sweeter and purer 
until they change into well springs of life. Let elective affinities 
have an unfettered exercise in charity, and by the conditions of our 
emotional nature they widen and deepen until they reach out and 
reach up to grasp and embrace all the true of earth and the good 
of Heaven. 

The minister of Christ has a further thanksgiving testimony. 
Public and private calamity, the wrecking of so many bright 
hopes and the deep shadows cast along the path of the future, 



11 

are proving largely instrumental in withdrawing the mind and 
weaning the heart of many from the mocking vanities of the 
world. 

As darkness thickens round us. the lights of heaven appear ; 
As earth grows dim and dreary, upward we look for cheer. 

This distillation of spiritual good out of temporal ill is not 
unusual in the moral government of God: and the preacher 
of righteousness who is or should be ever ready to aid in trans- 
muting the wrath of man into the praise of his Maker, seizes 
upon a juncture like the present to press home to the heart the 
teachings of Providence, interweaved and illuminated with the 
teachings of grace. Thus "man's extremity" becomes "God's 
opportunity." Nay more ; the minister of Jesus has a grateful 
testimony to offer at an hour like this in view of the new avenues 
open to evangelic effort, in lieu of those that have been closed, we 
trust temporarily, by the pressure of hostile interests. In these 
new "ways of Zion" he may take his stand for Christ and there 
build new "walls of salvation" and "new gates of praise." 

It is not to be concealed that there has been no little comming- 
ling of things secular and sacred, by many who have assumed to 
give only God's message to man's soul. It is deeply to be de- 
plored that such deflection should ever be given to the compass 
of preached truth. Our security is gone when the needle is not 
true to the pole. The needle has, it can have, but this one office. 
Nothing save this, however, can exercise that office. Nothing else 
points to Heaven's guiding star. Derange its action and you have 
lost your path upon the deep. The minister of Christ has one work 
and but one work; all his time, all his energies enable him to do 
that but poorly at best. God's work is too pressing — too vast to 
spare his laborer for the work of the state. Perishing souls are 
always calling him back to the office he has accepted in their be- 
half. Let him burn with patriotic ardor. Let him throw the 
weight of his character on the side of liberty, and law, and jus- 
tice. Let him freely offer the sacrifices which the exigencies of 
civil life may demand of him as a citizen of the commonwealth. 
But let him not forego that rigid discrimination of duty which 
makes him a spokesman, not of the people, but of the people's 
Saviour, — which makes him a guardian, not of civil liberty, but 
of the liberty wherewith Christ doth make us free, — which makes 
him an officer, not of those whose weapons are carnal, but of those 
who enlist under the Captain of Salvation. However some may 



12 

have failed to respect this discrimination of duty, either through 
too much fear or too much love of man, we have this day to bless 
the name of God Most High, that, despite the erring of the com- 
pass and the wild surging of the seas, the Gospel Ship has held 
her course, floating her grace-spangled flag, and bearing in safety 
her soul-saving truth. 

Shall we now take our appeal to the statesman, and enquire of 
him if he can " shew us any good ?" However scanty may be the 
testimony he can furnish, wherewith to frame a new anthem of 
thanksgiving, he cannot fail to recite the lesson of history, that 
grand ideas and heroic policies only have birth through the throes 
of the nation. He must admit that the crucial tests of an era 
like this, exhibit what is worthy and what is worthless in the 
organic life of the state. He must confess that a check to pro- 
gress such as we now are suffering, gives breathing space and 
ample opportunity to repair the mistakes of the past and guard 
the future from failure. He must give witness to the fact that 
issues like those now pressing upon us, give scope and elevation 
to the common mind, lift men from lethargy, quicken all the 
energies, and charge with fresh power all the elements of indi- 
vidual character; that however war is to be deplored, it braces the 
bulwarks of national life, exercises and strengthens by the exercise 
all the preservative ability it possesses. If here and now these 
historic truths are being reproduced, — if these be the lessons l'or 
the hour and the land, the testimony of the statesman would lead 
us to the altar of thanksgiving, there to praise the God of Nations, 
who is schooling us for a larger and truer life, and leading us by 
" a wav we have not known " into a new and richer inheritance. 

Summon the soldier, and be will tell you of scenes of Christian 
heroism he has witnessed, unsurpassed by any deeds of daring. 
He has beheld the sublime power of humble trust in Jesus, as 
it rose majestically above the perils of the onset, or calmly closed 
the eyes in triumphant death upon the battle-plain. He will 
sneak of a bravery which, l'or three times in our country's history, 
has returned from war wreathed with the chaplets of victory, and 
which now has grander exhibition than ever, when for the first 
ti me it lias met its peer, — when Americans stand shoulder to 
shoulder do1 only, but face to face. Can you help praising God 
for that noble courage in view of the hour when, by His blessing, 
it shall be sanctified and shine forth in all the splendor of bold- 
ness for Christ. Can you help praising God that the faith of 
the Christian has glittered more brightly than Hashing sword or 



13 

gleaming bayonet, and that amidst the wrecks and ravage of 
war, there has moved a 'presence mighter than all the munitions 
of armies, and grander than all the glories of triumph. That 
war is a curse, and internecine war a double curse, is universally 
true; but there are some things worse than war, and there are 
some things precious above price to the state, which never come 
except with war. Deprecating the dire necessity, bowing beneath 
the burden of bitterness, and wickedness, and death, and debt, 
let us not be blind to the indirect and resulting benefactions de- 
signed by such discipline, in the usual routine of the Divine 
operation. We thank not God for war. We cannot bless Him 
for desolation, and conflagration, and misery, and destruction. 
We have no heart, except the heart of the Samaritan, for the 
sickening scenes where lead and steel have had their will and done 
their work. We cannot love that which is the enemy of love. 
But, since the cross has been laid upon us, let us not lose its 
blessings. What humility, what dependence on God, what insta- 
bility of civil prosperity, what perils incident to the neglect of 
public virtue, what rebuffs to national pride and vanity are not 
proffered for our profit by war, the stern monitor. Again, what 
an awakening of strength, what a girding up of the loins of effort, 
what new birth of resolve, what a recasting of policies, what a re- 
examination of old safeguards and creation of new, what sacrifice, 
what discipline, what endurance, what a developement of heroic 
manhood are all associated with or consequent upon the delivery 
of war by a "mighty and puissant nation." We are ready 
enough to appreciate the horrors and groan under the burdens 
of a struggle like the present; let us be equally instant to 
appreciate the teachings of the hour, and return thanks for the 
benefits which of God's goodness may flow into our civil future, 
through the crimsoned channel of our present tribulation. Thus 
shall we with fidelity bear our part, in this mixed dispensation, 
toward God, the country and the soul ; praising the goodness of 
Heaven from chastened hearts, and looking upward for help and 
comfort with eyes swimming in dews of repentance. Thus shall 
we, moreover, gain experience of the truth and beauty of that 
hymn of the heart, — 

" E'en the rapture of pardon is mingled with fears, 
And the cup of thanksgiving with penitent tears." 

Time will not suffice that I summon the many waiting witnesses 
who stand ready on this day of thanksgiving, to reprove with 



14 

their grateful testimony the murmurers that enquire " who will 
shew us any good ?" Why the " very stones cry out "in attesta- 
tion of the Divine beneficence! All nature is vocal with songs of 
praise; the rustling foliage, the babbling brook, the surging sea, 
the whistling winds, the " cattle on a thousand hills," and the 
bright-winged warblers in metidow and grove, all sing 'their 
Maker's praise; and "shall we whose souls are lighted with wis- 
dom from on high," shall we whose heritage of blessing is rich 
beyond comparison, shall we who have souls, and Bibles, and a 
Saviour, and a Sanctifier, and a sure redemption, shall we who 
have a "goodly land " and a race of stalwart freemen to people 
it, shall we who for another year have been spared the blight of 
pestilence and the ravening of famine, shall we who have 
food and raiment, the hoarded sweets of home and the priceless 
privilege of the temple, shall we, when pricked by the sword of 
chastening fail in our tribute of gratitude to God, or withhold 
the ample " sacrifice of praise ?" 

As Elijah before his altar of Faith, and David standing at the 
shrine of Praise, perfected their offerings by the incense of prayer, 
so we, gathered to-day before the nation's altar of thanksgiving, 
raise our hearts to God with the hopeful appeal, " Lord ! lift thou 
up the light of thy countenance upon us." We "never despair 
of the Republic," we never despair of the triumph of the truth, 
so Ions as we have ease of access to Him who " waiteth to be 
gracious." The countenance of God, when lifted up, will drown 
in its glorious light the darkest clouds that ever lowered upon the 
soul, or upon the nation, and send sunshine to the deepest caverns 
of spiritual despair, or the gloomiest retreats of civil calamity. 

The lifted light of God's countenance is the amelioration of every 
state and condition of man, — is the alleviation of every "ill that 
flesh is heir to." The lifted light of God's countenance is an 
illumination of joy to His friends, a dazzling blindness to His 
enemies. In the restored light of His countenance we forget all of 
disaster and anguish past, and by this token are bold and hopeful, 
yea, confident of the future. Basking in that light we have a 
thousand-fold compensation for all the pains and darkness through 
which we have struggled to attain unto it. That light is the glory 
of the soul, the fullness of its joy, the utmost reach and compass of 
its felicity. But what it is for the saints, that it is for the nations. 
It is attainable by both on like conditions, viz : " fearing God 
and working righteousness. ' ' Our prayers for it are vain, except we 
fulfil these conditions of its acquisition. Before therefore I invoke 



15 

you to these prayers, I beseech you to cultivate that "fear of the 
Lord" which is "the beginning of knowledge," and that "right- 
eousness" which alone "exalteth a nation." 

Let then the nation to its knees. Let its mouth be as the 
mouth of one man. Let its appeal go up to God this day from 
Church and closet, "Lord, lift thou up the light of thy countenance 
upon us." If in Faith and Love that prayer be wafted to the 
throne, the fire will fall from heaven, kissing and consuming our 
' 'sacrifices of righteousness. ' ' The light lifted upon our rulers will 
illuminate their counsels, and reveal the path to honorable and 
lasting peace. The light lifted upon our people will assuage 
their bitterness and prepare them for a return to the prosperities 
of the past, or to advance to the richer blessings of the future. 
The light lifted upon field and tent will exhibit the discipline 
and devotion, the endurance and heroism of the soldier as meet 
preparation for service in the militant hosts of faith. The light 
lifted more distinctly upon the Church will make clear her vision 
of duty and of privilege, and open up broader fields of enterprise 
for her evangelizing energies. 

the light — the upper light, the light of God's glorious face, 
let it be lifted upon this land of our birth, this sanctuary of our 
social and civil joys, this home and hope of popular and religious 
liberty ! 

If now we have offered "the sacrifices of righteousness" and 
humbly "put our trust in the Lord," if we have opened up the 
fountains of gratitude in our hearts, and in glowing faith sent up 
on high our prayer for the light of God's countenance ; if this be 
the grateful sacrifice placed to-day by the people upon the nation's 
altar, the testimony of the Divine favor will not be withheld. 
And when it comes, if come it shall, a voice of glad acclaim shall 
go out from the mouth of the multitude, il Lo! righteousness 
and peace have kissed each other." 



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